


Figuring Things Out

by Rysler



Category: Wicked - Schwartz/Holzman
Genre: Drinking, F/F, Politics, coup
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-09
Updated: 2017-10-09
Packaged: 2019-01-15 08:10:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,225
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12317148
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rysler/pseuds/Rysler
Summary: Musicalverse. Glinda, after a lifetime of bad choices, orchestrates a coup to tempt Elphaba out of hiding.





	Figuring Things Out

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written in 2006.

The tree canopy was so thick that Elphaba never saw sunlight anymore. The Animals in exile ruled fiercely in the darkest parts of the forest. The yellow brick road had been torn to pieces. Moss grew in cracks between the bricks. The road held a greenish tinge. Rain rarely fell through the trees, but the humidity was endless. Plants bloomed green and pink and white in the dampness.   
  
Elphaba thought of Glinda often, now that there were no tests to cram for or parties to avoid or any Wizards to dream about. Glinda, tortured by the monkeys to reveal her location, or Glinda, corrupt and laughing in the Wizard's arms. Elphaba shook her head. She hated not knowing. At Shiz, she had known everything. She had known why the sun rose, and why Glinda's lips always seemed to be glistening, and what the kitchen was serving for breakfast every morning even before the menus were announced.   
  
Everything worth knowing, except the practicalities of her own government. She had been stupid, she had been naive, and she had abandoned Glinda.   
  
"Just say you're sorry." Glinda's words echoed in her head.  
  
Oz wasn't as simple as that.  
  
Every morning Elphaba awoke from her bed of leaves, and watched her broom fly around in tiny circles, and thought that day she she would say she was sorry.   
  
She  _was_  sorry.  
  
"I never should have left," said Elphaba, apparently aloud, for a crow cawed in response.  
  
She searched for the crow in the tree above her head. "Hello," she called to it. "Do you think Glinda could ever love me again?"  
  
The crow cocked its head, and ruffled its feathers, and said nothing.  
  
Elphaba sighed. "Oh, shut up."  
  
* * *   
  
Glinda sat across from the Wizard at breakfast. Or rather, she sat upwind of him, at a table so long he was only a speck of himself in the distance. She cracked the egg in her dish, and called out, "Have you heard from Elphaba?"  
  
The Wizard sighed. She asked the same question every day, and received the same answer. "Only rumor and innuendo," he said.  
  
She took a small bite of egg. It was cold. It was supposed to be cold, but it was cold all the same, and she made a face.  
  
"Have you read the day's agenda?" The Wizard yelled across the table.  
  
"Yes, Your Ozness," she called back. Today she would be making a speech to farmers who had lost their crops in a wild fire that had spread from the forests after a lightning strike. The wheat had been so brittle from drought that it had gone to cinder in a single night. She would be telling them that the Emerald City would be shipping them cake to eat all winter, and wasn't it wonderful that only 20 percent of them would die? "You don't have any magic," she muttered, looking hatefully at the Wizard speck.  
  
"What was that, dear?" He yelled.  
  
"Nothing," she said. "Just practicing my speech."  
  
"Wonderful!" He clapped his hands.   
  
The man actually clapped his hands.  
  
Glinda took another bite of egg. She inhaled, and said, "Couldn't we just build them an irrigation system?"  
  
"It's up to them if they want to build an irrigation system, Glinda. They have a Governor, you know."  
  
Glinda stuffed her mouth with the egg, so that she wouldn't say, "A broke governor, whose crops have failed to yield this year." The farmers would be so happy to see her that afternoon, she knew. They would try to touch her so that her goodness would infect them, and it would break her heart.   
  
"I never should have stayed," she said out loud, but around the egg it sounded only like, "This tastes great," and the Wizard smiled so benevolently she nearly choked.  
  
And that's when she got the idea.  
  
* * *   
  
"Glinda," said Fiyero, coming into her chambers carrying a bottle of whiskey and a box of tiny, crystal cups. "I came to cheer you up. This is what the boys call 'Doing shots.'" He set the whiskey on her desk and began pulling the cup out of the box and lining them in a row.  
  
Glinda sighed. She said, "To what end, Fiyero?" She'd arranged his enrollment in the palace guard right after his graduation from Shiz in order to keep him close, because he was the only one who had been friends with Elphaba. He stayed close because he didn't have anything better to do. She understood the feeling.  
  
"To get very, very drunk," he said brightly.  
  
Glinda ran her forefinger along the rim of the first cup. She said, "Fiyero, why aren't we married?"  
  
He dropped a cup, and had to throw himself to the floor in order to catch it. "Glinda," he said, panting, "I don't--"  
  
"I know we aren't getting married. I know. I just want to know why."  
  
His head appeared from below the desk. He said, "The real reason?"  
  
"Don't you think I'm strong enough to hear it?"  
  
Fiyero grinned. "Take a shot," he said, and poured liquid into each cup.  
  
Glinda picked up the first cup and took a small sip.  
  
"You have to do it all at once," he said.  
  
"Why?"  
  
"That's what you do."  
  
"Why should I do something just because it's done?"  
  
"To get very, very drunk," he said.  
  
She tilted her head back and drank all of the amber liquid, which burned her throat and warmed her stomach and flushed her face. She inhaled deeply.  
  
"See?"  
  
She licked her lips to catch stray drops. "Another," she said.  
  
"There's a whole row."  
  
She picked up another cup. "Fiyero, why?"  
  
"Because shots are done in rows."  
  
"No, why did we fall out of love?"  
  
"Because we're too much alike."  
  
She frowned.   
  
"We are."  
  
She drank the second shot, and let its magic flood her, before meeting his eyes. She said, "But you're all brooding and good, now."  
  
He smiled.  
  
"What's wrong with being alike?"  
  
He settled back onto the floor, and leaned back against the desk. "Well, Glinda, most people don't like themselves. So meeting someone like them... Well, it's like looking into a mirror. If you do it too much, it can become a terrible curse."  
  
Glinda put her chin in her hand.  
  
"We can be friends, Glinda. Kindred spirits. But we can never be lovers."  
  
"Then who should I love?"  
  
"Someone completely different than you. Someone who baffles you so much you want to figure them out, and challenges you to look at things another way."  
  
Glinda drank another shot. Fiyero closed his eyes and was silent. Glinda sighed. Fiyero reached behind him for a cup, and took a small sip of it.  
  
"Elphaba is a better person than the Wizard, isn't she?" Glinda asked.  
  
"Yes," said Fiyero.   
  
"And she should be ruling Oz, not him, right?"  
  
"Yes."  
  
"Not us?"  
  
He chuckled, and said, "Definitely not us."  
  
"Her. And would you support me if I made that happen?"  
  
"In a coup?"  
  
"Um... Yes."  
  
Fiyero laughed. He took another sip of whiskey, and said, "Sure. I'll support you, Glinda. Anything you say."  
  
She nodded, already lost in thought. "Good. Good."  
  
* * *  
  
Breakfast with the Wizard came after two days spent in the library, and another day talking to Oz's top scientists. Glinda watched closely as the Wizard ate his poisoned egg.  
  
Though she had once given a horrible hat to a horrible roommate once in order to humiliate her, and though there were still rumors surrounding her possible aid to the Wicked Witch's escape from the Emerald City, Glinda had just done the first truly Un-Good thing of her life.  
  
The Wizard seized his throat and gasped for air. His eyes widened with fear and anger.   
  
She folded her hands neatly on the table. "Here's the deal, Your Ozness. You're going to be very ill for awhile, and I am going to rule in your place. You're going to tell Madame Morrible that, and anyone else who needs convincing. Or."  
  
His eyes widened further, so that the whites showed as bright circles. He wasn't even trying to breathe now. He just sat petrified and as pale as a ghost.  
  
"Or, instead of falling into a deep coma, I will let you die," she said, and smiled.  
  
His mouth formed words, slowly, as his lips turned blue.  
  
Glinda stood up. "Do you  _think_  that I am bluffing?"  
  
He shook his head.  
  
"Good."   
  
The seizure that had overtaken him seemed to pass, and he took several shallow breaths. Color began to return to his face. He said, "Where did you learn such magic?"  
  
Glinda leaned on the table. She said, "Oh, it's not magic, Your Ozness. Merely the appearance of it."  
  
He whimpered.  
  
"Guards!" She called.  
  
Fiyero burst into the door, rifle in hand. He took in the terrified old man and Glinda, towering over him and smiling just like Elphaba used to.   
  
Glinda gave him a little wave, and said, "Bring Madame Morrible to me."  
  
Fiyero ran his fingers through his hair. He took a deep breath, and said, "Well, fuck."  
  
* * *   
  
When the public proclamation had been made, and Glinda the Good had seen the citizens of the Emerald City weeping with love and throwing roses at her feet, she settled in the window of the emerald tower, and looked out over Oz.   
  
She could see grey mountains and green hills and blue rivers and black forests, and though the horizon was hazy where it touched the ground, she imagined she could see gold. The desert, marking the borders of her domain, was just out of reach. She swallowed.  
  
Fiyero set down a tea cup beside her. "She'll come," he said.  
  
"How will she know to come?" asked Glinda. Her voice was thick with tears.   
  
"I hear she's smart."  
  
"Propaganda," she said.  
  
Fiyero chuckled. He put his hand on her shoulder, and said, "She'll come."  
  
And she did, that night, after Glinda had fallen asleep in the shadow of the Great Machine. Her cheek pillowed against the Wizard's cheek, she had been dreaming of home when footsteps awakened her.   
  
"Fiyero?" She called into the darkness, standing.  
  
"It's me," said Elphaba.  
  
Glinda plunged forward blindly, and was caught by two strong hands, that drew her further forward still, into the embrace of the Wicked Witch. Elphaba held her tightly, and said, "I heard there was a regime change and I thought...I thought..."  
  
"I orchestrated it all," said Glinda. She pressed her face into Elphaba's shoulder, and smelled must and dirt and hay, and great Ozma, she had to make Elphaba take a bath.  
  
"You?" Elphaba cackled. The sound rose, evil and sharp, in the vacuous room, and Glinda closed her eyes to hear it more clearly.  
  
"Yes. Yes."  
  
"Then why are you clinging so hard I can barely breathe?"  
  
"I was so afraid you were never coming back," said Glinda. She lifted her face. Elphaba's eyes shone in the darkness. Glinda lifted herself on her toes and kissed Elphaba's lips. Elphaba kissed her back. The pressure of her mouth brought heat between them, and when their tongues met, Glinda tasted fire. She broke apart, gasping.   
  
Elphaba wiped her mouth, and said, "What was that for?"  
  
"Everyone knows that a kiss from the Good Witch offers protection. Now you can travel throughout Oz and you won't be harmed. You can fly away."  
  
"I don't want to fly away," said Elphaba.  
  
"Good," said Glinda, panting slightly. "Because I may have miscalculated."  
  
"Oh?"   
  
"I don't know much about ruling," said Glinda.  
  
"I see."  
  
Glinda seized Elphaba's hand, and pulled Elphaba toward the Great Machine. She said, "I could use the help of someone who actually paid attention during political science courses."  
  
"Who would that be?" Elphaba asked.  
  
Glinda ignored her, and said, "Not to mention someone who could balance my innate goodness with some... Er..."  
  
"Practicality," Elphaba suggested.  
  
"Whatever. I thought it would be fun." Glinda led Elphaba past the dormant head, and took her into the inner chambers where the window stood open, letting in the starlight. She turned to Elphaba, and put her arms on Elphaba's shoulders. "If I did it all for you, and you're wicked, does that mean I didn't do it for goodness' sake?"  
  
"I have no idea," said Elphaba.  
  
"Will you stay?"  
  
Elphaba looked around at the small room, taking in the fineries and the artifacts and then taking in Glinda, standing before her, with the starlight in her eyes. She cleared her throat, and said, "I only ever wanted to be worthy of serving the Wizard," she said.  
  
"I think I'm the Wizard now," said Glinda. Her thumb traced Elphaba's jaw.  
  
"Am I worthy?"  
  
"Why do you think I arranged all of this to get you here?" Glinda asked.  
  
Elphaba grinned. Glinda cupped her cheek and kissed her again. When their lips broke apart, Elphaba said, "I'm tired of sleeping in a barn, anyway."  
  
"Well..."  
  
"Anyway. What will be your first action as ruler?"  
  
Glinda twisted to face the window. She leaned back in Elphaba's arms, and said, "My first is ordering a royal bath. With lots of bubbles. I do love bubbles."  
  
Elphaba sighed.  
  
"I'll be naked," said Glinda.  
  
"I love bubbles, too," said Elphaba.  
  
Glinda smiled and squeezed her arm. She said, "The second... This may not be the appropriate time to mention it, but have you noticed your sister is a total bitch..?"


End file.
